


Aftermath

by MountainRose



Category: Onmyouji | The Yin-Yang Master (Movies)
Genre: After the battle, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Medical Procedures, Missing Scene, before the parting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-17
Updated: 2021-03-17
Packaged: 2021-03-26 07:02:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30102117
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MountainRose/pseuds/MountainRose
Summary: Boya returns to his home, only to find it lacking.
Relationships: Pre boya/Qingming
Comments: 3
Kudos: 16





	Aftermath

Boya returns to the sect to find it...cold. High in the mountain above Imperial City, where the cloud and fog are indistinguishable, and the sun rises above a sea mist as often as it strikes the city, of course it is cold. <

But that has always been true, and today he finds his rooms cold in a way that is both novel and disquieting. 

His back still aches, pervasive with the chill of leaving his body on the damp stone while he fought, and the smell of snake lingers heavily on his leathers. His country is without an emperor, the city broken and crumbled, with half its people camping in the grassland outside the walls, their homes too wrecked to safely approach.

Victory feels like a mockery. 

He has not taken another step into his rooms. The chill, the chill, he despises this place with a sudden and unexpected fervor. He turns around and leaves. 

Qingming is in the palace, injured and in care of the Imperial physician. The palace is gaping empty now, the staff quietly dismissed over ten years to hide the paper Empress. 

Not even a guard remains on the gates; there is no one to protect. 

He finds Qingming sleeping, haunted quietly by his surviving spirit guardians, and let's himself fold to the floor beside a tea set and brazier. Somewhere he can watch the man breathe. 

Finally, he does not feel so cold. 

"Boya-daren..." 

"Honey Bug. How is it." 

She settles at the tea set, her body weightless and not even denting the cushion. "He will be well." 

Boya grunts, head thumping back against the wood paneling and limbs dropping into a sprawl. 

The figure on the bed, who is not quite Qingming, since Qingming is a vibrant, awful, emotional creature and unconsciousness has wiped all that away, is pale and breathing shallowly through parted lips. Draped carefully in royal bedsheets, he could be an old god, sleeping forever. 

Boya hates it, and has the irrepressible urge to go over and pluck even a single strand of hair out of place, so he looks less like a porcelain statue. 

The click of a teacup draws him back from his unsightly urges, and he meets Honey Bugs gaze across the table. She is a meek, quiet and largely unknown creature, their acquaintance brief and fraught. But. He understands a little now, how Qingming is the axle upon which this small world turns. How kindness and duty and personal affection can bind even demons and spirits. 

He takes the tea. 

Ginger, sweetened with honey, light and fragrant green tea... It's a luxurious thing that chases away some of his lingering chill. He sighs out steam, body softening. 

"And him?" He points with his cup, eyes hooded, to the rougher jumble of steel and leather and stone. 

"Killing Stone is battered, but his bones are iron." 

There's no sign of the other two, the Painter and the flying Hound. Unnamed spirits, the men in white from before, move quietly around the edges of the room, barely corporeal and eyes unblinking pools of ink looking out at the world. When they walk, they move further than they step, and they do not bother with corporeal things like doors or furniture, but glide through them like smoke. 

He had felt alone walking away from Qingming, alone in the crowded sect, deploying his men, alone, fearing Qingming was also alone. 

Now he feels... Comforted. And foolish. And still a little cold. He curls his other hand around his empty cup and tries, in his exhaustion, to take a sip. Frustrated and feeling slow, he puts the cup down.

In the course of the gesture, his left hand trembles and sends the cup clattering. He hisses in pain; the deep slice he'd used to open his veins and meridians hasn't closed yet, though the blood has long since stopped. 

From his jumble of stone sword and armor, Killing Stone jerks upright, eyes wild at the sound. The guarding spirits all turn their inky eyes on him with disconcerting unison. 

"No threat, no threat..." He mutters, clasping his hand over the bandage. The guarding spirits take him at his word, but Honey Bug and Killing Stone do not. He settles against the wall, hugging his stone sword and yawning massively, while she moves as silently as her other form, landing lightly at his left flank with a tray of softer bandages and vials of medicines. 

"Allow me, Boya-daren..." 

Her delicate touch lands on the back of his hand, like the tiny feet of her butterfly form and... He lets go of the bandage, giving over and turning his head away. 

"It's nothing," he mutters, meaning 'don't take trouble'.

"Mmhm, it's nothing," she repeats, meaning 'it's no trouble'. 

He falls silent, used to being patched and mended and bracing for the dry, brutal pain of pulling away his hasty bandages. She is swift and sure about it, the flaking dried blood fragile still, and the pain is at least brief. He lets out a long, rattling breath. 

"This needs sewing closed... Can you bear it, Boya-daren?" She is quiet and confident in it, her hands pointing to the deepest part of the wound, where it crossed through the spiritual vein. He peers into the wound, but his eyes blur with the usual nausea of seeing inside oneself. 

"I can. Be quick."

She prepares thread and alcohol swiftly, feeding him some and pouring the rest over her tools, then setting them on fire. Unnecessary dramatics, but potent liquor. 

It doesn't numb the awful, meticulous process completely, but it does allow him some distance from the tugging of silk though his skin. He keeps his gaze firmly away, watching the restless spirits patrol the windows and doors. 

Killing Stone is wild eyed still, glaring at a piece of dirt on his stone sword. 

"I'm sorry I woke you..." Boya murmurs, awkwardly. Formality would feel wrong, but familiarity is equally uncomfortable. 

Killing Stone shakes his head as though it's nothing. It's not nothing; a week ago they were enemies, deeply unequal ones. The least Boya can do is avoid startling him. The thread pulls tight on a particularly painful stitch and he shudders, distracted. 

He glances at her work before remembering why he doesn't; the foreign presence of the needle under his skin makes his whole being crawl with the need to scratch it back out of his flesh. 

He reaches for the tea and pours himself a cup with deep, concerted focus. It's that or the hard liquor, and he has a strong feeling that Honey Bug already gave him plenty. The ginger and honey is. Fine. 

He is in control of himself and his arm does not flinch away from her attentions. But he hates it. 

"How do you do that. Drink tea so calmly," Killing Stone asks with horrified fascination. 

"Who's calm." 

Honey Bug laughs softly. "His heart is pounding, I think he is being very brave." 

His secret thus betrayed, he toasts her with his cup. The alcohol has given everything a hazy quality, and the dangerous sense that everyone here is a friend. In fairness, they are his friends. They are Qingming's good friends, and he is Vermilion Bird now, hah! 

He keeps his face stony, knowing that this madcap thought process needs to stay inside. 

His arm cools abruptly, the feeling of some kind of balm spreading along the wound. He avoids looking, still, until the bandages are tied and tidied. 

"We are heavily protecting this room, Boya-daren, so the fighters may rest. You are welcome to remain here under that protection." He assesses the state of his head, the mild spinning of the room. "You haven't given me a great deal of choice, have you." 

"It's not everyone who can sit there motionless as a sandbag and let me sew their skin closed." 

"This wine could fell a horse." 

"Don't be silly; horses have no tolerance at all! This is spirit wine. It's more on par with a rhino." 

He salutes her with his tea again. His face, he feels disconnected from, though he suspects it still looks murderous.

"I will accept your hospitality, and your wine, gladly." 

"Mmhm, no more wine for you, you should sleep just fine with this much." 

He concedes, nodding and feeling his physical state agree with her. 


End file.
